Barack Obama

Did then-President Barack Obama put this painting into storage in the White House in 2014 and has President Joe Biden put it up for auction? No, that's not true: This painting, "Washington Crossing the Delaware," was on loan from a private collector who decide to sell it to other private collectors. While it hung in the White House from the…

Did former German Chancellor Angela Merkel reveal in an interview plans by the United States and NATO for war in Ukraine with Russia? No, that's not true: Nowhere in her interview with the German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, which was published in November 2022, does she talk about NATO plans for the war. The claim appeared in a Facebook…

Did Michelle Obama's doctor go on the record about the former first lady using a urinal during the 2008 presidential campaign, thereby proving that she is a man? No, that's not true: The article making this claim originated in 2017 on a now-defunct satirical website called America's Last Line of Defense. Clearly marked disclaimers on the original website, run by…

Did actor Tom Hanks' name appear on the flight list of a private jet owned by Jeffrey Epstein, the U.S. financier who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges? No, that's not true: Hanks' name does not appear on the flight logs for Epstein's plane, which have been in the public domain since 2015.…

Does a photograph of former Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump show Obama using his middle finger to express his unfavorable opinion of his successor in the White House? No, that's not true: The image has been altered from the original, which shows the two men shaking hands during an Oval Office meeting in 2016. The claim appeared in a…

Were there eight presidents of the United States before George Washington and did several Black presidents serve before Barack Obama was elected in 2008? No, that's not true: Washington was the first elected American president. There is a lack of historical evidence; plus, examples of genealogical research and, more recently, DNA testing that show no president prior to Obama was…

Was former President Barack Obama interrupted by uncontrollable chanting of "Fuck Joe Biden" during a campaign rally in Detroit, Michigan, on Saturday, October 29, 2022? No, that's not true: A video included on social media posts making the claim was altered to add the loud chanting to Obama's reaction to a single heckler during the speech. The claim appeared in…

Did former President Barack Obama "expose" himself by referring to his wife Michelle as "Michael"? No, that's not true: While he did say the words, he was not talking about himself -- he was citing another person's experience. The claim appeared in a Facebook post on September 24, 2022. It contained a video with a TikTok logo. The caption is:…

Can a president of the United States declassify classified documents and information by simply saying "it's declassified" or by just "thinking about it"? No, that's not true: There is a procedure for presidents to declassify documents and it is spelled out in the Federal Register, which is the official journal of the federal government of the United States. Lead Stories…

Did Hallie Biden, the widow of the president's son Beau Biden, start a new Twitter account? No, that's not true: Twitter has taken down this account, but while it was up it did not have a checkmark confirming that it's authentic. It tried to lure people into donating money to a PayPal account. Screen grabs of the account are still…